The series is over and the celebrities have all gone
home to celebrity land, so let's sit back and enjoy some highlights
from the first half of the current series.
Would you like to say the words?
Let's start the show! Oh, perfect, who needs celebrities?
CHEERING
Oh, not a bad line-up, not a bad line-up.
Er, welcome, all. So lovely to see you all.Yeah.
Scrubbing up, very nice, nice. Scrubbed-up. Thanks for
having us. So, Taylor and Bono, have you worked together, no?
Not yet, we're going to talk about it later. OK!
But no, Bono, you did a very nice thing when Taylor got
to Ireland... I've been, I'm a Swiftie...
CHEERING
We're highly aerial birds, you know.
Over the years, we've bumped into each other...
He doesn't want to take credit for the fact that he's so nice
he sent me roses when I played in Dublin. Yep.
He doesn't take credit... Red roses, you know.
He's a truly great person...
There you are...
Beautiful.And he's just that great and thoughtful, just the
best there is. I'd better have a drink.
Here's the thing - Bono and Taylor have not worked together,
but weirdly, Taylor and Eddie, you have worked together.We have!
Wow, yeah. It was a decade ago. I once died in his arms,
in a screen test for Les Mis.
I did not know this, I did not know this.
So, yeah, there's a lot that people don't know about this story.
Basically, I was auditioning for two roles in Les Mis, and I'd done a
few auditions and gone to New York and whatever, and I think it had
been established that I had more of a look of Cosette,
but I had the range vocally of Eponine, so it was
established that, like, I was there for a good time,
not a long time.
LAUGHTER
But they were like, you know, "Do you want to come to London
"for one last screen test? And you'll get to screen test
"with Eddie Redmayne." I'm, like,
"This seems like an experience I want to have in my life."
You're, like, one of my favourite actors, you're so
ridiculously talented. Oh. I was like, "So, yeah,
"I'll go to London..."
I get there and they're like, "OK, so we really want to
"make you look like Eponine, we're going to...
"You know, she wasn't, like, loaded, she had brown teeth,
"you know, she didn't have a lot of money, so..." A 19th-century
street urchin... Exactly. I'm trying to say it in a way that
makes sense... She didn't floss. Exactly... They were like,
"We're actually going to paint your teeth brown for this."
And I'm like, "So, you're going to do that after I meet
"Eddie Redmayne, right? That's not something you do before.
"I get to meet people, then you do the brown teeth."
They were like, "No, no, it's...
"Everybody's going to meet you with the brown teeth, we're going to do
"big circles under your eyes, like you're near death..."
I was like, "This has immediately become a nightmare for me."
And then so... You were so nice, but I think when I met you,
I was like...
SHE MUMBLES
What was hilarious was... is you walked in as a
19th-century French street urchin, and, and I was not expecting that.
Yeah. But my overwhelming memory of it, Taylor, was...
I'd just been to Pizza Express beforehand, and I'd had
some garlic doughballs...
LAUGHTER
I thought we were going to be singing-off with each other,
but they had us... It was so weird, cos Taylor was dressed
fully as Eponine, and I was in my tracksuit...
And they had us on the floor, like, singing sweet nothings
into each other, and all I knew was I just had garlic breath.
LAUGHTER
Talking about Les Mis, Samantha Barks... Yeah.
..one of my closest friends. Never go to a karaoke bar
with Samantha Barks... She's amazing... Yeah.
I was up singing Lady Marmalade, giving it all I've got,
and then she just gets up and then I was like,
"Oh, yeah, I remember, I can't actually sing...!"
But she is incredible. Samantha Barks, who was in Les Mis,
and is amazing, plays Elsa in Frozen,
and I took my kids to go and see, and they got to meet Elsa
in Frozen and it was the best, like, sort of celeb name-drop
I've ever succeeded... Can't talk, can't talk about Frozen! Oh, no!
Yeah. What happened?
Came second in the Oscars to the song.
LAUGHTER
So sorry. My life is filled with Frozen fractals all around.
It's the best lyric, it's a great lyric, it was a great song.
Yeah. And you should listen to that, Bono, let it go!Yeah.
LAUGHTER
LAUGHTER DROWNS OUT SPEECH
And now, Kate, your underwater stuff. There's been a lot
in the press about you holding your breath, and you're very good at it.
Mm. Because Tom Cruise has been on this very sofa talking about his
holding breath...Oh, has he, now? Yes.OK, I'm curious about that.
Well, he held the record for celebrity breath-holding,
which is a very niche... Very niche thing.
He clocked in, 6 minutes 30. You thought I was going to say,
like, 45 seconds.
6 minutes, 30.Which is 6 minutes 29 seconds more than
Chris Moyles on I'm A Celebrity...
LAUGHTER
OK, so that's Tom. We're just going to see the end of Kate Winslet,
seeing how long. So she's been in the water, so you'll see
the back of her head, it's Kate's... There she is.Yeah.
So, how long has she managed? Roll it...Here we go.
Here we go... That's nice, here we go...
SHE GASPS
Am I dead, am I dead?
You are alive, you're very much alive. What was that?
What do you think it was?
I don't know, it could have been 6:10, it could have been 7:10.
It was 7:15.
ALL SCREAM
ALL WHOOP
Wow.
It's unbelie... What goes...? I mean, cos seven minutes is
so long. Were you thinking about... dinner tonight?Yes, I was.
OK, chop the onion, peel the garlic...
Count the slats on the floor below me. I mean, firstly,
I do have to just say this, it is a sport, it's not something
you can just try in the bath, and you should never, ever...
No, I really mean this, you should never do it by yourself,
because actually what happens when people don't know what they're
doing, is they come up and they... You saw I did a breathing
sequence... Yeah...the second I came up. And then I was talking
like a totally non-breathy person. So what happens is, people
come up and they go... LOUD GASP
..and that's when people black out and run into trouble,
so it is not something you can just do, without knowing
what you're doing. So, the training I had was three weeks of
training every single day, and you learn how to, literally, change
how you distribute the oxygen in your body, it's a very detailed,
quite extraordinary process and I loved it and got really,
really good at it, it turned out.
You know who's running a bath right now...? Tom Cruise!
LAUGHTER
Yeah.
He's got the timer on his iPhone, he's in there.
And it's a first-time welcome to Lydia...
APPLAUSE
APPLAUSE DROWNS OUT SPEECH
We've got to go with the extraordinary success of
It's A Sin. Obviously, lots of fan reaction and people in love
with you on the street but then you got some very special
fan reaction.Yes, I did. So, my friend asked me if he could
give Elton my number...
"Elton." "Elton."
And I was like, "Elton who...? And he was like, "Elton John."
And I was like, "Ahh, OK!" And then within two minutes of sending
that text, Elton was calling me, and it was like 01 number...
I won't give his number...
LAUGHTER
I think you can give it to all of us!
Let's call him now!
And he called all of us, he called the whole cast, and he
called Russell. How lovely. I know, it was so sweet.
Thing is, once he called one of you, he had to then call everyone!
I was like, "Oh, my God, Elton John just called me..."
That's beautiful.
Isn't that a lovely thing to do? That's lovely.
Then everyone was like, "Yeah, we got the call too."
And I was like, "Oh." That makes me very happy. Yeah.
But did he... He flew some of them to LA for the Oscars party,
didn't he?He did, yeah, so he flew some of them for the Oscars party
and he also invited us all round for a curry.
And I don't know if that's confidential information, but...
It doesn't sound confidential.
I didn't go because I was away, so it was all the boys,
but they had a curry and maybe an orgy.
I don't know. Can I just say? Wow.
That isn't where I thought that story was going.
My question - is "having a curry" a euphemism?
Because if it is, I need to know what the euphemism is,
because I'm American and we just don't know
what "having a curry" means, but I'm kind of liking it.
LAUGHTER
Anyway, here you are, Lesley Manville, movie star now,
movie star, and yet, theatre, you love theatre.
I mean, years ago, I saw you in The Cherry Orchard
with Dame Judi Dench.Did you?
With Sam Mendes, the child Sam Mendes.Oh, look at me.
Oh, God, that's depressing! No!
Untouched by time.
And Dame Judi Dench, she has a reputation for being quite naughty.
Naughty?! That woman should be locked up.
LAUGHTER
I mean, she is... I mean, she is so naughty.
Do you want to know what she did to me one night? Yes, I do.
So, there's a moment in The Cherry Orchard
where my character was onstage, on their own, for a short time.
Judi Dench, she's in the wings trying to make me laugh,
trying to corpse me, which is... Yeah...trying to make me laugh.
And she is...
How can I put this?
..she's pretending that she's being...pleasured
by somebody...
..from behind.
LAUGHTER
So... Excellent. I'm sorry, Judi, if you're watching,
but you shouldn't be so naughty!
So I'm onstage, and I can see all this,
and I'm desperately trying not to laugh,
and the important bit of information here is that I'd just had a baby,
so my pelvic floor wasn't quite what it should have been.
Now, I was wearing a long dress, but I...
Judi made me laugh so much that I wet myself.
And it gets worse, because the stage was raked, which means...
So I watched my piss...
..trickle down.
APPLAUSE
Wow.
I don't think I was there that night, no.
Well, if you were in the front row,
you'd have seen it go over the edge.
That woman is so naughty.
I mean, you must have stories about her.
You worked with her...? I've worked with her a few times.
Oh, my God. We did a play at the National Theatre called
Entertaining Strangers, which was an ensemble,
I mean, a promenade production,
which meant the audience was in amongst the actors and vice versa.
And one evening, she was in the...
..offstage, and she could see a mutual friend, Howard Davies,
the director, sitting amongst the group of people on this stage,
so she thought, "Oh, I know," so she scribbled a note,
and then as she passed by to go and do this scene with
Tim Pigott-Smith, she scribbled down, "Fancy a shag?"
And as she walked past him,
she dropped it in his lap and carried on, did the scene,
and feeling very smug and pleased with herself, and at the end of
the scene, she sort of looked round
and realised it wasn't Howard Davies.
LAUGHTER
That is so good!
Here's the thing. The last time Stormzy was on the show, you did
an amazing performance, and after that, off he went to Glastonbury.
Yeah. You were the first grime artist to ever headline Glastonbury.
Yeah. And this look is now so iconic,
the Banksy bulletproof vest.
So did Banksy...? Like, how do you get
a Banksy bulletproof vest?
It's just kind of bestowed upon you.
LAUGHTER
I swear to you, that's... That's what it feels like.
It was like the third...
Have I told this story before? I'm going to tell it anyway. Yeah.
So my contact with Banksy was...
He is as elusive as you can imagine, like, as in...
Is your contact with Banksy, Banksy?
Not really, no, it's like...
No, it's not really. You get contacted through notes, like...
It sounds... Yeah, yeah.
It's quite, like... Is it cloak and dagger?
Basically, like in a nutshell.
And then, yeah, it was mad.
Sometimes... Can I be real?
Talking about Banksy, I feel like...
Whenever people ask me, like, about the vest, I'm like,
"Who sent you here?"
Like, yeah, something, like...
I don't know, yeah, I might just - zip.
You know what I mean?
Do you go, "Dear Banksy, I need a large."No, no, no.
Anything Banksy does, that's one thing I can vouch for Banksy,
is that, yeah, he literally found me
and said, "I've made something for you, like,
"if you want to wear it, like, if you don't..."
And I was like, "Yeah, I definitely want to wear it, please." Yeah.
Really, I was like, "Yeah, please."
And then, yeah, and then we'd done some fittings for it, and then,
yeah, it was just very, very, very...insane.
Did you actually meet him? I can't... I can't...
You can't say, can you?
He so did.
"Went for fittings," I mean... No, no, he weren't there.
That's going to be someone else. See? He was never... I swear to you.
Or she was never there.
ALL: Oh!
You know, like...
Daniel, did you ever want to do anything else,
or was it always just actor, actor, actor?
When I grew up, I mean, I wanted to be an actor,
but there weren't a lot of outlets for being an actor where I grew up,
so I was probably going to join the Navy at one point, and then
I sort of got into waiting, and then I nearly took a job on the QE2.
I would still be there, probably.
Is it still floating, the QE2? I don't even know.
I don't know, one of them is.Yeah. But I was a waiter, yeah.
And from about 16, I waited. In posh restaurants or...?
I mean, they were kind of posh.
They were in Chester, which makes them kind of posh. Chester's posh.
Yeah, but there was always a fight. I don't know what it was.
There was always a time where you'd sort of like
go round the back and you could smoke back there,
and so you'd be having a quick fag round the back,
kind of like on your break,
and then you'd sort of hear this "Raar!".
And there'd be a chair thrown.
You'd be like, "What? Why? We're a silver service."
Fine dining in Chester.
Yeah. Live reporting from the dessert station.
LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE
I saw it last night, it was just terrific.
For most of the film, your character refuses to feel pain.
Yeah, that's based on the real Agojie women as well.
They were literally were taught not to feel pain.
Which must be quite hard to pretend that I'm not going, "Ow, ow..."
Look at that clip there, you see me standing on a rock.
There's about five rocks under my foot there...which is fantastic.
But did they give you a protective thing for the sole of your foot?
No.
LAUGHTER
No, we were just barefoot, just raw, the whole time.
Which was amazing because we were, you know, we were 3am,
doing stunts, in the dark,
taking down men, as you see,
and like I said, 100% standing the whole time.
Are you fighting with a sword? Yeah, with a machete in my hand.
So you've got the sword and you're throwing him? Yeah. Damn.
And then after I throw him...
After I throw him, I then have to take him down again. Yeah, yeah.
And because you'd done things like Captain Marvel and James Bond
and stuff, were you ahead of the game,
where you ahead of the class?
No.
I thought I would be, but I wasn't. Oh, really?
I wasn't ready, I'm not going to lie.
I thought that, having done a couple of stunts,
that I'd be able to just go in and springboard off experience
but, no, this was throwing men, this was machete work,
they were really heavy, this was discovering muscles
in your wrist that you didn't realise you had. Mm...
This was working on a Sunday...
LAUGHTER
Big Zuu laughed first!
LAUGHTER
He was waiting, like...
I saw your eyes!
I ain't saying nothing! LAUGHTER
Lay it out, I want to hear it.
It's just, you know, you were just, the right hand, innit?
Well, I learned about all that, so that's fab.
And, obviously on the show, there's children on the show
and there's lots of extras and background artists.
But there was one background artist who apparently was very
impressed to see you. Do you know who I'm talking about?
No.
Yes, you do!Is it... I mean...
There was one. She kept saying... She got confused.
She thought I was someone else.
I thought she was being really nice, and she went to me,
you're doing really well for yourself, aren't ya?
I was like, "Ah, thank you, love." You know how extras can have conversations with you?
Sorry, supporting artists, can have conversations with you
and you're like, OK, you know, and they have really interesting
conversations sometimes. And she went, "You're doing really well for yourself."
"Thank you very much." And you're being polite, do you know what I mean?
And then I was like, yeah, yeah.
And she went, cos I never thought it'd happen for ya.
And I was like...
OK, OK. Where are we going now?!
And then she was like, well, you know, after Big Brother...
And I was like, "What the...
"Hang on. Sorry, love, what?"
And she went, "Well, you're Craig from Big Brother."
There you go, look. See.
APPLAUSE
I love that she thought that Craig from Big Brother was playing
the lead in...I know. It was just one of them things. But the crew...
Yes, yes, go on, Graham. You're going to show it, aren't you?
Yes, yes. The crew. What did the crew do?
The crew overheard this conversation.
Yes, they did overhear, yes.
And Aaron, our wonderful DOP, decided it'd be great
for on my final day, when I had a big heavy scene with me wife
and kids, that the crew would all have these T-shirts on.
And he goes, action...
LAUGHTER
There's Aaron, the big lad there.
APPLAUSE
And Pete and all the boys, yeah.
So, you're filming a murder mystery in Greece,
but then you must have been having a good time, because apparently
when you stopped filming, you would then go home...
Keep playing murder mysteries. You are playing murder mysteries.
Well, first of all, I feel like Covid
and the fact that we had to shoot it
and be very careful sort of forced us all,
whether we liked it or not, which, thank God, we loved it,
to play together. And what do you play when you're doing, you know,
a part of the Knives Out franchise?
You know, you're going to play a murder mystery. And so we played...
Do you know this game Mafia? Do you know Mafia? Anybody?
Oh, my God, I know it. They play Werewolf here.
Werewolf, yes. Werewolves and Villagers.
The town priest, that one.
Edward knows! Yeah, I love that game.
So basically, we'd be sitting here like we are, and one of us
would be Mafia, but convincing each other that someone else was...
You're not Mafia, you're a townsperson. Is this fun?
It's so fun. It doesn't sound fun.
It's so fun. It's so much fun. It's hilarious.
I've played it. Kate hosts these games at her house.
I've been lucky enough to be invited to play Mafia at Kate's house,
and it is so fun.
And actually, the last time we played it was a while ago now.
It was a while ago. But Ryder played, I remember.
Oh, my God. He was good.
He was really good, and I wanted to straight up murder that kid.
It was really hard to do, because nobody wants to kill the kid,
but I did. Yeah. I think I did. You killed Ryder, yeah.
So, does more than one person get killed?Oh, yeah.
The whole point of the game is to kill everybody. The whole village.
Oh!Yeah. That's sounding more fun.
LAUGHTER
And then you go to the bar.
So the thing is, you get killed and then you go to the bar
and you watch something really interesting. You watch who's lying.
Yes! And it definitely breaks up marriages. Like...
My husband and I really don't like playing together.
It's like, wow, you are...you're terrible.
It's like one of those... You're a liar.
You have the late-night thing where it's like,
I can't believe you killed me like that.
And you were Mafia. Edward's nodding.
Mine would be dead.
Done, the first round.
And, Edward, you're nodding, but do you actually play this game?
I played it on a boat and one of the players was Oprah.
Yes!
Can I just say... Wow!
APPLAUSE
Way to shit on them!
You win! You win!
And Oprah, you don't expect Oprah to lie. No!You don't expect...
She won. We'd all go round the table and just like literally try
to skip to the next person, but she was good.
How do you kill... You can't kill Oprah!
Even if you know she's Mafia, you're like... It's not possible.
..we'll get her next round. She lived till the end.
I'm sure she... I bet she did. And beyond.
Oprah!That's so great.
That's the best name-drop we've ever had on the show.
On a boat with Oprah.Oh, yeah!
LAUGHTER
APPLAUSE
Geena, Geena, lovely name, but you spell it differently, with two Es.
Yes. Why is that?
Well, I was named Virginia, after my aunt, and her nickname was Ginny.
So, my parents thought that we have to come up with a different,
you know, a different nickname, and hit upon Geena.
And then when I started acting and I was in articles or whatever,
my mum said, people seem to love the way you spell your name.
And I said, yeah, yeah. I always say you didn't know how to spell "Gina".
She said, "Oh, no, I knew how to spell it.
"I grew up in an Italian neighbourhood.
"I knew absolutely how to spell it.
"Why did you spell it with two Es, then?"
She says, "Well, I didn't want anyone to think your name was GI-na."
LAUGHTER
Just so we're clear,
my entire identity is based on fear of vaginas.
I know how you feel. Um...
That was good.
No, no.
And, now, I'm losing my mind. Have I seen you play a vicar before?
Um, I think I played a vicar in a...
Like in an Anthony Trollope, you know,
sort of old-fashioned vicar ones. You look so right in it.
Well, it is good. It's a good fit.
Well, my dad was a minister in the Church of Scotland.
He wasn't just a minister. He wasn't just a minister.
He WAS the Church of Scotland.
No, he was the Moderator of the Church of Scotland for a time
as well, yeah. He was pretty high up.
And now is it true the thing that you and your father into adulthood
NEVER swore in front of each other? No! Never!
I never swore in front of him, and I never, NEVER heard him...
He was a man of the cloth! He was a clergyman, for goodness' sake.
Except... LAUGHTER
I never heard him swear.
And I suppose he heard me swear in things, you know,
but that was always "the script", so that was fine.
But I would never swear in front of my dad, never.
And I-I don't think a swear word ever passed his lips...
until he came down to stay with me in London once
to go and see Billy Connolly. Billy Connolly was...
We grew up loving Billy Connolly, and we'd have the cassettes
of Billy Connolly in the car, and my dad was a big Billy Connolly fan.
So, he came down to London to see Billy Connolly,
and then he came back and started doing bits of the act.
And it was all very, oh, that's very funny.
But then, I guess because it was "the script",
suddenly he's standing in my living room at midnight going,
BLEEP!
SHE COUGHS
APPLAUSE
Wow! This is the Moderator of the Church of Scotland!
I'm thinking, he could be excommunicated!
But because it was Billy it was allowed. Billy's a special case.
Yes, of course.Yeah.
Oh...my Go...
First of all, on American... ..you've got one shoe on!
Well, it's purchase.
I'm on a couch, you know how you have to get purchase sometimes?
Anyway, on American television...
WHISPERS: ..you can't say that word.
On British television you can't say that word.
Oh.. But he just did.
But we're not live.
AUDIENCE LAUGHS
I really hope I haven't given you ideas now.
Well... Oh, no, I've already like blown it, you know.
But I know you have a thing -
you don't like to eat out alone, still now.
Mm, I don't mind eating on my own.
The problem is, as a stand-up when you're on the road,
you're often forced to eat on your own.
But what I like when you're eating on your own is
this sort of degree of discretion because you don't want everyone
to know you're eating on your own.
And I had a situation where I was caught out
in America by a little Americanism that they like there.
I was dining on my own and I went to put my name down for a table
at this restaurant and the hostess came back out about five minutes
later and there were some other people waiting for tables as well.
And then at the top of her voice, she used my name
in the most depressing sentence I've ever heard it used,
because she walked out and she went, "Jack Whitehall...
"party for one."
Aww! No! AUDIENCE LAUGHS
Everyone is looking over to see who the pity party for one is.
I have to do a walk of shame through the restaurant...
Right to the back. Right to the back.
..she sits me down at this table.
She then does that thing and I don't know why they do this
when you're eating on your own in a restaurant,
she makes a big song and dance of removing the plate setting
opposite... Yeah! As if to say, we don't want anyone looking over
and thinking that someone might be able to sit down opposite you.
That is so true, they do always do that.Why? Why do they do that?
Then she came back with a menu, by which point I was like,
this woman is taking the piss.
She puts the menu down in front of me,
she goes, "Well, you're not going to be interested in this first
"page because this is all of our sharing plates."
I get it, I haven't got any friends.
She goes, "Here we are, sir, this is more your area here.
"Wines by the glass."
I was like, "Oh, madam, how wrong you are. I'm British.
"I may eat for a party of one but I drink for a party of five!"
AUDIENCE CHEER AND APPLAUDS
Erm...
Oh, my God!
Erm...Can I just say, what's worse -
I'm just going to completely, I'll come back to...
Yeah, yeah do, yeah. We'll come back to you. OK.
What's worse is when you're on a plane... Yeah?
..and... You have to eat on your own then.
No, no, no, well... But you're on a plane and they say,
wait for it, "Muslim meal."
No! Muslim meal! I'm like, are you for real?
I'm on a plane!
Like, what?!
And you have everyone just go...
Travelling alone. I'm like, what?!
AUDIENCE LAUGHS AND APPLAUDS Come on!
Yeah, yeah, same thing.
That is worse.That is worse. That is worse.
That is worse.That is worse. I have never had that experience!
And George Takei, Star Trek legend but...
AUDIENCE CHEERS AND APPLAUDS Yes, but...Yes!
You can still do it. Live long and prosper.
Yes, you can still do it.
But the weird thing is you have a catchphrase and it's not that.
I mean your catchphrases isn't even from Star Trek?
No, it's from a shock jock
named Howard Stern.
Yeah. Yeah.
He's a dear friend and he's been a partner of ours,
my husband Brad, in talking up equality for LGBT people.
AUDIENCE CHEERS And, uh...
But I had never met him.
When I was first invited to do his show,
I was doing a play in New York and when you're doing a play,
the publicist gives you your assignment.
Yeah.So I went to that address on Madison Avenue.
They asked me to wait on a couch sort of like this
and they had the radio on and I was looking through magazines
and I thought...
that show that they have on is disgusting.
It's vile conversation.
So I said to the person sitting next to me waiting, I said,
"Why can't we have good music here? This is terrible"
And she said, "That's the show we're waiting to go on."
THEY LAUGH
And then right on cue, the receptionist came,
ushered me into the studio.
I walked in and there's this tall, wild haired,
horn rimmed glassed guy.
And I said, "Good morning". And he says, "You have a deep voice.
"A voice like that must have a big dong below."
AUDIENCE LAUGHS
I asked, "Are we on the air?"
And he said, "Yep".
And I said... IN DEEP VOICE:Oh, my...
And he had it on tape and so whether I'm there on the show or not,
when someone said something or does something outrageous,
he presses a button and my voice comes on.
"Oh, my..."
AUDIENCE LAUGHS
It has become my signature.
Very good. And now where did the music come from?
Ooh... Um... Where did the music come from?
Well, my mum and dad actually met onstage doing Pirates of Penzance.
Hello!So... Wow! Yeah.
..probably there, but my mum's not a great singer.
My dad... My mum was one of the maids
and my dad was the pirate king.
O-K.
Hell, yeah. And here I am. So...
AUDIENCE LAUGHS
No, I say it because you are a great singer and we've heard you sing
and now there's this clip that has been out in the world.
How is it out in the world? Did the school release it or something?
Yeah. Yeah... So this is a school production of Phantom of the Opera?
Whoa! The first-ever amateur production in Ireland.
Were you the Phantom? I was the Phantom. Stop it! Yes.Yeah.
Get in! Yeah. Now, remember, this is a school production.
I don't know what school you went to but, uh...
The production values, I think, are quite high.
I think probably people...Yeah. ..have seen professional productions
not as good. So this is Paul Mescal as...
Oh, now, do you remember the name of the lady?Jessica Hackett.
Jessica Hackett, it was on the tip of my tongue.
I knew I knew her. Uh...
Paul Mescal and Jessica Hackett in Phantom Of The Opera - enjoy.
MUSIC PLAYS Look at this, come on, look at this!
Is that real fire? No, it's a like a...
Like a screen? Look at that mask!
I'm guessing that's a wig. Yes, yes.
HE LAUGHS Oh, I hope she doesn't faint.
She might faint, I hope she doesn't faint.
Look how long my hands are.
AUDIENCE LAUGHS
You're both feeling this... Yeah. So much.
Oh, no, I think she's getting a bit faint, she might go, she's...
Oh!
AUDIENCE APPLAUDS
It's very good.
AUDIENCE CHEERS
Urgh! But...
But I was wondering, so famously, Phantom Of The Opera,
at the end of Act 1, a chandelier comes crashing down to the stage.
It's supposed to come cra-, like swooping in. Yeah.
Big dramatic moment. Yeah.
But that's where the production values -
we'd use them all like on the, like, candles, clearly. Yes.
But we did have...
a kind of ramshackle...
I tell you what, I'll fast forward it. Here is, uh...
So talk us through this. So you went for slow motion?
Well, we didn't have an option because that's how... Oh, wow!
..fast it moved. The stage...!
These stars are giving it their all.
Yeah.
EXAGGERATEDLY SLOW: Oh, no!
Look at them, they're so good.
Best single work we have.
Oh... It's something. ..it's still going.
Yeah. Still going.
AUDIENCE APPLAUDS
Ooh... Wait a second, wait, wait, wait, and...
it's hitting the stage...
..now! There you go!
AUDIENCE CHEERS AND APPLAUDS Very good. Very good.
It was impressive. I know, they built it in the school hall.
It was crazy. That was evocative and safe. Yeah. Moving!
Where did you shoot? It was so beautiful.
Oh, so beaut-, it was so stunning.
Inis Mor, uh, in the Aran Islands off Galway,
and then Achill Island, which is further - a little bit up.
And it was a combination of the two and we stayed there for...
On the island, 750 people. Heaven. Mm.
Three weeks and so... Fab! We'd be, you know...
meeting each other on the road on our day off...
THEY LAUGH
So it merged into it, yeah.
But there were tourists there? Yeah, there was.
On any given day during the summer,
there could be 2,000 tourists coming in on boats and planes
and cycling around, renting the bicycles and horses.
He had a...he had a... Stop! ..an interesting kind of, uh...
Shut up.
THEY LAUGH
They have horse-drawn, you know, carts that they kind of carry
tourists around and stuff and Colin, as he likes to do,
went down for a jog.
I'll let you tell it. No, carry on.
No, I was just going for a j-... and it was a warm summer's day
and I had my shirt off, I'm jogging in me little runner shorts,
with a slit up here. Yeah, got you. Only a couple of inches.
Moving along. And, yeah, one day there was a horse and cart
and there were six people on the back of it and all of a sudden,
I noticed that they were only keeping ten feet ahead of me
with all their cellphones up on the video.
So I stopped and pretend to have a bit of a stretch
and touch my toes and that,
and they'd stop, and then I go, "For f..."
So I'd start running again and then they'd take off again.
So, for about an hour we kept about ten feet apart,
and then I thought, "Ah, feck this. I see a hill coming.
"There's no way the horse can get up that hill as fast as I can run."
Well, we were neck and neck for about half a mile.
LAUGHTER
We were neck and neck for about half a mile.
Just before we got to the centre of town...the horse...
..the horse took it, the horse took it.
That's you guys there, that's you guys there.Thank you.
Welcome, all! Welcome, all!
Lovely to see you. Have you come straight from rehearsal?
Oh, it's exhausting!
Yes, we have. We have come straight from rehearsal.
We've got a few days left.
Oh, it's fun and games!
You haven't started yet, Ian!
Apart from this show, when did you last do a pantomime?
Er, in 19...
LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE
Ouch!
It was...1990.
And were you...?
1990 in Harrogate.
Were you in a frock? No. No. I played...Rollo, I think.
Thigh boots? No, no. I think we had...
I think I wore... What do you call those things? Knickerbockers?
Ah. I think I had those on, yes.
Was that the attraction of doing the...?
It was a job, Ian. It was a job!
LAUGHTER
That was the attraction.
So, this production of Mother Goose, what makes it special?
It sounds like you've thrown everything at this.
It's got it all.
HE SIGHS Well...
I went to the management
and I said, "Before I finish, I want to play a dame once more."
I have played Widow Twankey in Aladdin. With great success.
Thank you. And as the saying goes,
"Once they've seen your Twankey, can a Goose be far behind?"
LAUGHTER
APPLAUSE
But Mother Goose is the great part for a dame,
because it's at the centre of the story. It is not on the adjunct.
It's all about a woman who is not quite happy with her lot,
and has her wishes granted. And... we'll see what happens.
And, John, who do you play? I play...
I play Mother Goose's husband.
Very good.Yes. Called what? I only... I only found...
I'm called Vic. Vic Goose.
And I only found out, here, in the research chat here,
that I am Ian's first-ever stage husband.
Well, now!
CHEERING
And I...
I'm John Bishop's first...
..er...stage wife.
CHEERING
No, but the others have been women.
LAUGHTER
No, it's about our relationship, it's about...
It's about fame, it's about money, it's about chasing your dreams
and realising they're not the same.
And mixed in that, there's some knob gags and singing and dancing.
LAUGHTER
And, Mo, is it really - you were kind of performing music
before you ever turned to comedy?
Oh, yeah. Like, my dad is very musical.
So, like, in the show I do... I've got a show.
And basically we do this thing called Nursery Grimes.
So we get a nursery rhyme and we get a song. So, like...
Just classic nursery rhymes. But we do a different rendition of it.
Obviously, my dad is a Rastafarian,
so we do his Rastafarian take on it.
So instead of "the wheels on the bus", it's...
# Da wheels on da bus go around and around! #
It's... It's like when I do, like, comedy shows now,
I have it on my Netflix special.
So people are like, "Go on, do the rhyme,"
cos I have it in the special. I'm like, "No, I can't just do it."
I'll be in Tesco and I'm like...
"The bags are 30p already..." LAUGHTER DROWNS WORDS
"Do the rhyme." I'm like, "No, I don't want to do it."
And before you know it, I'm...
# Old MacDonald, him sat on da farm... #
Bruce, you've been singing professionally.
Next year you will have been singing professionally for 50 years,
ladies and gentlemen. Wow!Five decades.
Actually... Oh, is it more?
Yeah, actually...
Actually, I've been singing for 60.
LAUGHTER
I've been playing with my band, in a year, for 50 years.
50 years. Oh, THAT'S the 50, OK.
That's tricky. Imagine this -
the same people...that you went to high school with,
all of the same people...
That's so sweet.
..for the rest of your life.
LAUGHTER
For the rest of your life you work with them every day.
And no-one can be replaced or changed.
Oh...
Tell me, when did... when did the thing...?
Your crowds do this now. They have signs with the songs
they want to hear. When did this start?
I don't know. 10, 15 years ago people started to...
It was my fault, because I started to play requests.
So people started to bring signs about what they wanted to hear.
And...to keep the band from getting too comfortable,
I would pull these signs out of the audience,
show them to the band and we would play them. You know.
But it's not always your songs! No, it can be anything...
LAUGHTER
The poor band is like, "My God..."
"Here, Bruce, do The Wheels On The Bus, mate.
"Do The Wheels On The Bus."
I going to tell you, I have done The Wheels On The Bus many times!
I have three kids,
and I have sung Wheels On The Bus, not with that accent,
but many times!
And tell me about... Wasn't there a man who wanted to hear Drift Away?
Do you know the man I'm talking about? He had a sign?I do.
Tell the people what the sign said.
It said, "I will give my left testicle to hear Drift Away."
To whom?
LAUGHTER
That is the question. That's a good question. That is the question.
I certainly didn't want to be responsible for it,
so we played Drift Away.
Now, talking of fans, you play the songs for the fans,
but you do seem to go above and beyond.
This was, I think, earlier, back in the '80s, I think.
Do you know the story where you were...?
I think you were at a cinema.Yeah. Was it in Denver?
St Louis. St Louis.
You were in the cinema in St Louis. Take it away.
Unless it's a different story. No... Unless it's a different story,
and you're thinking, "He can't want me to tell this story!"
I was in a cinema by myself on an off night from the tour
in St Louis watching Woody Allen's Stardust Memories...
OK.
..during which Woody Allen is not necessarily so kind to his fans
in the film.
So, I had met a kid in the lobby.
He was there with his girlfriend.
And he said, "Do you want to sit with us?"
So I said, "OK."
See? Already, I'm just thinking that's just a hard no. Isn't it?
"Do you want to sit with us?""No." "No! I don't."
But no, you did it. You're lovely, you went and sat...
So I went and I sat. And we watched the movie.
And he says, "Is that how you feel about your fans?"
So I said, "Well...not so much."
He says, "I'm going to go home now.
"Will you come home and meet my parents?"
You didn't?
I said, "OK."
Oh, I love that.
And so, I went somewhere in St Louis
with this kid.
And we walked in the door.
And it's about 11 o'clock at night.
And he says, "Mom, Mom!
"I have Bruce Springsteen with me."
And she goes, "Who?"
No!
And he runs in his bedroom and he comes out with the album
and shows her the album cover.
He says, "Bruce Springsteen."
And of course, then she goes, "Oh, my God!
"Let me make him some eggs."
LAUGHTER
And so around midnight, I was sitting in a little house
in St Louis having some eggs with this kid and his mom and...
And I saw them for decades after that every time we came to town.
Oh! What a story!
APPLAUSE
Ladies and gentlemen, Mr Bruce Springsteen!
CHEERING
Oh, yeah!